Jean Louis Rodolphe Agassiz - Mt. Auburn Cemetery - Watertown, MA - Grave of a Famous Person on Waymarking.com

In Watertown, within Mt. Auburn Cemetery, is this grave for Jean Louis Rodolphe Agassiz.

Mt. Auburn Cemetery is located off Mt. Auburn Street at the boundary between Watertown and Cambridge. The best way to get to the grave is to first stop in the information office near the entrance and get a map. There are two. The one that I'm referencing is the smaller map. There both he and his wife, Elizabeth, are marked by a dot as No. 1. Parking is challenging as nearby roads are narrow. We parked in a circle marked as Laurel St, off Walnut Avenue. From there, walk on Bellworth Path past the Bullfinch monument to a group of graves on the right where there is a marker in the form of a red cross supported by rocks. The marker is next to this one.

The grave is a chunk of stone planted in place, with the words engraved in it. On the side sort of facing the cross is the following:

"Jean Louis Rodolphe Agassiz
Elizabeth Cary Agassiz
1822-1907"

Side facing Bellwort Path:
"Boulder from the Aar Glacier"

Louis (as he came to be known) Agassiz was born in Motier, Switzerland. He studied at several universities in Europe, finally receiving a Doctor of Philosophy at Erlangen and a Doctor of Medicine at Munich. He also expanded his knowledge in botany at this time. He later moved to Paris and later started in the study of Ichthyology (fish). His first work was characterizing freshwater fish in Brazil (work published in 1829). In 1842, he completed the work, A History of the Freshwater Fish of Central Europe. He became interested in fossils of fish, and from this study he published his defining work, "Recherches sur les poissons fossiles ("Research on Fossil Fish"), completed in 1843. Moving to the geological sciences, Agassiz was the first to propose that the earth went through periods of glaciation, and that many bolders were moved by glaciers from their origin to the place they were found. In 1840, he published, Etudes sur les glaciers ("Studies on Glaciers"), which explained the geological forces of glaciers and that Switzerland had once looked more like Greenland.

In 1846, Agassiz came to the U.S. with the intent to investigate the geology of North America and deliver 12 lectures and ended up staying in the U.S. for the rest of his life. His lectures led to the establishment of the Lawrence School of Science at Harvard University, with Agassiz at the head. There, he also founded the Museum of Comparative Zoology and served as the first Director until his death in 1873.

There is more about the influence and complexity of this man on Wikipedia, link below.

Description: Louis Agassiz was a noted scientist and professor at Harvard University who made contributions in biology and geology and founded Harvard's Museum of Comparative Zoology. Date of birth: 05/28/1807 Date of death: 12/14/1873 Area of notoriety: Education Marker Type: Headstone Setting: Outdoor Visiting Hours/Restrictions: Daylight hours of the cemetery Fee required?: No Web site: [Web Link]

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